


New

by nerdrumple



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: ... in a bathtub, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-25
Updated: 2014-09-25
Packaged: 2018-02-18 16:47:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,887
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2355512
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nerdrumple/pseuds/nerdrumple
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mr. Gold suddenly remembers who he really is... and who Lacey really is. He goes searching for her immediately.</p>
            </blockquote>





	New

**Author's Note:**

> Just a little _whoo hoo the season premiere is right around the corner_ fic.

Something had happened.

The day had been ordinary. The rent collection, the excuses, the threats, the trembling hands offering over payment. But someone new had come into town, and once Gold heard her name, something had happened.

It didn’t happen all at once. At first it was a strange pleasing touch in the deep of his belly, a tight little satisfaction that spread out and had him smiling. Emma, what a lovely name. He’d gone home letting the satisfaction wash over him, not quite sure what it meant, not quite sure what the tingling was. But soon the tingling began to change, began to feel numb, began to lock his limbs, began to feel painful.

And then the memories started.

_We had a deal! We had a deal!_ barking through his mind, twitching his fingers and toes and shaking his head. _I want a name_. _Who are you? What’s your name?_

_Rumplestiltskin, at your service._

That’s right, he was Rumplestiltskin. The Dark One. And Emma was the Savior, and her name was his escape clause to get out of this curse before anyone else.

A ringing in his ears. The curse! Yes! Bae! The Evil Queen! Yes, it was all coming back, and it was painful and throbbing but a smile spread over his face slowly and he clutched at his cane and, and,

Ah, yes, the cane. He was Rumplestiltskin, but he was also Mr. Gold. Damn Mr. Gold, and damn this cane.

He stumbled through his shop. He needed to get home, needed to rest, needed to let the rest of these memories wash over him. This was the price he had to pay, the writhing pain, allowing a name to unlock all of his memories while the rest of the town would simply have to wait for the Savior to bring their memories back. He clutched at the counter, another wave rolling over him, and he knocked something over.

A chipped cup. The one he’d never been able to part with, for some reason. He picked it up, and a fresh wave took him.

Belle! Oh, god!

She wasn’t Belle here, of course. She was Lacey. Gold stumbled out of his shop, chipped cup in hand, cane forgotten, the pain of his limp dragging behind the pain of the memories. The tingling was everywhere now, blinding and searing, and he groaned aloud into the night air.

She didn’t live far, he decided.

He had known her for years. The shy and sweet librarian. Terribly shy, a broken spirit with a history of time spent in the asylum, rumors surrounding her as to why. He didn’t care, as long as she paid her rent on time. But one brush of the skin can lead to another, and when he didn’t recoil, she ventured again and again, until a date to Granny’s and some white wine and chicken parmesan later he’d hoped to gather her up into their first kiss. He didn’t let just anyone in, after all, and she looked him in the eye where everyone else averted their gaze. She’d known a darker fear, he’d rationalized, darker than a town-terrorizing pawn broker, but when he kissed her there was a sense of disappointment in her eyes, small but tangible. The brushes of skin were still there, but no more white wine, no more chicken parmesan. Perhaps the new rumors of being _touched_ by the town monster were too much when coupled with the rumors of insanity and instability.

His footsteps were managing to sway even though the road was straight and he was so cold and his hair was streaking down his face and why was that? It was raining, yes, and initially the cold helped to ease the tingling and numbness but now it was just making it worse. I’m almost there, he thought. The twitching and shaking mocked him, and something was tearing through his belly and his knees were on the pavement and now the contents of his stomach were too, but it was time to get up because he was almost there, he was almost there.

He had failed her. A brave girl with ambitions to save her town that saddled her with nothing more than a job as his eternal maid, but she’d pushed and prodded against him, slithered under his grey skin. One token of trust can lead to another, and when she didn’t recoil, he ventured again and again, until a test of letting her go led her coming right back to him. What he’d anticipated as being their first kiss turned out to be a terrible trick, and he’d shoved her away until she was nothing but a dead girl dead memory murdered by her father murdered by the clerics murdered by _him_ and all I tried to do was let her go and it hadn’t been a trick it hadn’t _Don’t you see it’s working!_   _That means it’s true love!_ He had tried to soften the blow by just letting her go.

I didn’t let her go, he cursed himself, I pushed her out.I abandoned her. Told her it was forever, _dearie_ , then abandoned her.

But she wasn’t dead. His Belle wasn’t dead, after all. She’d been here, all along.

There was blood under his fingernails. Had he been clawing at his face, his neck? This was more painful than he’d anticipated, the rush of memories, and there were so many. So many years returning, so much rejection and fear and cruelty and _deals_ and what a little devil he was. He’d had all that was precious ripped from him, so it was the only thing he’d accept from anyone else. _I require something more precious. It has to be the heart of the thing you love most._

He must have been walking on that road for hours. But Storybrooke was such a small town. He knew exactly where it began and closed, could trace his black finger from end to end. And no matter where he ventured, he could never leave, he knew. Not yet. But when he could, he’d take Belle with him, whether she remembered him or not.

The night air was coming in, and the stars, and the moon, and he tugged on his jacket, and when had it gotten so dirty? His leg was throbbing but so was everything else; at least the twitching had subsided and his scalp felt easier so he must have stopped pulling at his hair. But most importantly, her door was in sight.

When he knocked, the shivering started to kick in. His bones began to ache like crazy. Just knocking on her door made his skin tighten around his knuckles and he was so cold, his little veins seemed to have stopped their blood in one place, or maybe he had bled so much he simply ran out of the stuff. Perhaps just knocking on that door was what made the skin rip and bleed.

When she answered, she was groggy with sleep. But so beautiful. Her hair was dark and long and it contrasted sharply with the robe she was wearing. In the moonlight that came in on her it looked like she was bare of everything except that long, flowing hair.

Mr. Gold, Mr. Gold, she kept saying. “Rumplestiltskin,” he tried to correct but all she probably heard was clattering teeth gibberish. She looked at him, though, she looked at him. He must have looked like such a wreck. All that dirt. All that blood. Streaky from the rain, freezing. The cusp of fall and winter, a freezing night tangled all around him. He’d held out the cup, their chipped cup, and when she took it, her mouth was open and silent.

She let him in. He knew he was dripping all over the carpet. She let him in and rushed off somewhere in the apartment to go get something. His arms were glued to his shivering little torso and he stood there stupidly. She hadn’t turned on any lights when she woke up. The whole place was just as dark as the night outside. Light and shadows were coming in through the windows but it didn’t look spooky at all. Not at all, he decided. Because he was here, here with his Belle.

She returned with a towel that she wrapped around him and his eyes felt like they were falling out but surely they weren’t because he was able to just stand and look at her. He didn’t say anything, but he was thinking Thank You and I Love You and I’m Sorry About Your Carpet. He knew if he had said that last one she would have smiled and said it didn’t matter. He loved that, even though she never really said it.

She took to him right away and led him to the bathroom. She set him down on the toilet seat, kneeling down in front of him with her hands on his shoulders looking him right in the face and asking if he was all right. Do you need help? Shall I call someone? Do you need to go to the hospital? Something like that, all he could do was smile at her, and think about how he must have looked like such a broken, funny man with all that dirt on his face.

She stood up saying something about a phone but he grabbed her, pulled her down again. No, he said, no hospital, no doctor, no mayor, no Regina, no no no. Just you, Belle, just you and me please. I came here for you, please. I’m fine.

He put her hand to his cheek and she stared at him for a long time, something anxious working at her brows. If anyone would understand not wanting to go to a hospital, it had to be her, he rationalized. When she withdrew her hand he whimpered, but she only turned to start drawing him a hot bath. Steam rose up from the faucet and just looking at it he could feel his bones begin to _relax_. Finally. The tingling and the memories settled into the heat and steam and calmed themselves around him.

She turned back to him, stroked his hair. She had these lips like a small petals that he just wanted for the rest of his life, and _I’m so sorry I turned you out, Belle_ , but he couldn’t get the words past his grubby smile, so he touched the petals instead.

She was shaking too, funny little Belle, and she left to go make him something hot to drink. He was left alone there, in that bathroom, for just a few minutes, before she returned. But it was those minutes, oh it was those minutes.

He started to look at myself. Something magic was happening, he was sure of it. Not the magic he knew from back home, but something new, something light and part of this world. He was at the top of the ceiling and looking down at himself. Where her hands had been placed upon him he could see these shining little patches through the blood and dirt. He was a mumbly heap of mess and he felt something right then. That bathroom was pale green, little square inch tiles all over the place. His whole life was in that bathroom all of a sudden, years and years hanging from the walls, lost sons and cruel wives and damn pirates and pretty maids and talented daughters and desperate deal makers and and and

Steam, nice steam rising from that bath. Belle didn’t know him. Belle didn’t know that he knew her. Belle knew Lacey, and Mr. Gold, and why had he believed Regina when she said she’d been dead?

He giggled. I saw you before you saw me, he thought, and right there, in that little bathroom, her handprints on his shoulders felt like the weight of love and a piece of good that she had set right on top of him.

When she returned, she had a cup of hot tea that tasted wonderful and his insides loosened with the warmth. She knelt down in front of him again, her hair everywhere and the right shoulder of her robe tipping off. He finished the tea, and they sat in silence and that smile must have still been plastered on his face because she’d started to wear one too.

When he set the cup down she made like she was going to reach for it and put it back in the kitchen, while saying something about leaving him to his bath or letting him have some privacy while he cleaned up and she’d get a first aid kit and “Take your time, I’ll be right out here if you need me,” and he couldn’t help but chuckle because she was being so _motherly_ and he guessed he always knew it was in her but he was used to her being a shy little thing. Lacey, but she wasn’t Lacey, she was Belle, his Belle, and Belle had fire and spark.

She made like she was going to reach for the cup but he got her by the waist and they both fell into the tub. They tumbled right in and knocked their heads on the porcelain and it hurt, but he didn’t care. Water sloshed out of the tub and went all over the place like a little flood. It was so hot it stung his body at first, but only at first. When they got up they were both drenched and sitting in that tub together and her hair was matted all over her face from the water and they were both _petew_ -ing with their mouths and he really didn’t know what she was thinking just then, but she laughed. He did too.

He pulled her back under the water with him, hitting his head on the faucet and he kissed her. He kissed her. Sopping wet clothes and white, blinding porcelain. Her robe billowing up at the top and she threw it off of her. His clothes so heavy and she helped him off with his jacket and shirt and the rest. He held her to him. Like a big blanket that warm water enveloped them, and suddenly he was outside of himself again, on the ceiling again. He kept kissing her and she kept smiling and holding his face and he was on his back and she on top with her legs curled in this awkward way; the tub was small for the both of them. Water kept sloshing everywhere, but he didn’t care. He was on the ceiling again watching himself and now those little shining patches were all over; one big glow, one big moon from that tub. Belle and Rumplestiltskin. Mr. Gold and Lacey. Her hair sticking to her body and his, and she was so beautiful, her eyes and her face. How could I ever forget, he yelled at himself, how could I _ever_ forget?

“This is my new favorite memory,” he said. Let this land and the next know that all he wanted was this little green bathroom, again and again.

She grabbed his face and held it, pulling steam from him with her breath. Your name, she was saying, please tell me your name please and he was smiling and chattering his teeth and trembling his lips but he managed to get it out. “Rumplestiltskin,” he said.

“And I’m Belle,” she said, wide and grinning, eyes closed with relief falling over her.

“You know?” he asked.

“I always knew. That’s why I was gone. Why I was locked up, for so long.”

“Never again,” he promised, pulling at her face, pulling at her hair, closer, closer, pulling at her underclothes, away, away, “never again.”

Wet skin sliding and _nothing had ever felt this good_ and the memories were still popping up in bursts all over him, in his brain and his chest and his stomach but he kept them out of his hands and mouth because those were only meant for Belle.

She had reached around him and was now massaging something into his scalp and over his back and hands and he realized she was washing him. Lithe fingers worked at the knots in his hair and careful thumbs traced over the sharp, stinging lines of his face where he’d hurt himself and he could feel the memories swaying down now.

The writhing had stopped and the memories were pooling down somewhere hidden, somewhere outside of this bathroom and away. He kept the good ones near. Her blue dress and her laugh and him sitting at the wheel, wondering why she was smiling at him like that. She was smiling like that at him now, but there was red excitement in her cheeks because they were naked and wet and he was palming her, neck and breasts and back and then everything all over her. I’ll wash you too, he thought. I’ll wash the whole of me over the whole of you and maybe one day you’ll forgive me I’m so sorry I’m so sorry.

_Never again,_ he repeated out loud, _never again_ , over and over, until the rhythm matched their bodies, until he was spilling his apology into her, until she was forgiving him with a cry.

**Author's Note:**

> Title in reference to ["A New" by Little Dragon](http://nerdrumple.tumblr.com/post/98351245007/reference-song-for-a-new-a-new-by-little-dragon)


End file.
